Wrestlemania
WrestleMania is a professional wrestling pay-per-veiw (PPV) event, produced annually in mid-late March or early April by WWE, a professional wrestling promotion based in Connecticut. WWE first produced the event in 1985 to be its premier annual event and has since produced twenty-eight editions with the twenty-ninth scheduled to take place in East Rutherford, New Jersey in 2013.WWE regards it as a flagship event due to it being the most successful and longest-running professional wrestling event in history. WrestleMania was conceptualized by WWE owner Vince McMahon. WrestleMania's widespread success helped transform the professional wrestling industry and make WWE the most successful wrestling promotion in the world. The event has facilitated the rise to stardom of wrestlers including Hulk Hogan, Rowdy Roddy Piper, Macho Man Randy Savage, The Ultimate Warrior, The Undertaker, Shawn Michaels, Steve Austin, John Cena, Batista, Rey Mysterio and CM Pun. Celebrities such as Aretha Franklin, Cyndi Lauper, Muhammed Ali, Mr. T, Alice Cooper, Lawrence Taylor, Pamela Anderson, Mike Tyson, Donald Trump, Floyd Mayweather, Snoop Dogg and others have participated or made special appearances within the events. WrestleMania propels the worldwide commercial success of the WWE through media, merchandise and shows. All of the events produced have been sold out within a short period of time, with recent editions being sold out within minutes of tickets going on sale. The first Wrestlemania was held in Madison Square Garden in New York City; the 10th and 20th editions were also held there. Wrestlemania lll in the Detroit suburb of Pontiac, Michigan was the highest-attended indoor sports event in the world, with 93,173 fans in attendance. The record stood until February 14, 2010, when the 2010 NBA All-Star Game broke the indoor sporting event record with an attendance of 108,713 at Cowboys Stadium. All but the two editions held in Toronto, Canada have been hosted in U.S. cities. Organization The WrestleMania logos used for the I-XXVIII eventsWhile WrestleMania events have taken place mostly in sports arenas in large cities, a number of them have occurred in large stadiums. The most-attended events include Wrestlemania lll (93,173) in Pontiac, Wrestlemania VI (67,678) in Toronto, Wrestlemania VIII (62,167) in Indianapolis, Wrestlemania X-Seven (67,925) in Houston, Wrestlemania X8 (68,237) also in Toronto, Wrestlemania XIX (54,097) in Seattle, Wrestlemania 23 (80,103) in Detroit, Wrestlemania XXIV (74,635) in Orlando, Wrestlemania XXV (72,744) also in Houston, Wrestlemania XXVI (72,219) in Glendale, Wrestlemania XXVII (71,617) in Atlanta and Wrestlemania XXVIII (78,363) in Miami . WrestleMania centers on the main event matches for the WWE Championship, and since WrestleMania XIX, the World Heavyweight Championship. The ECW World Championship was only defended once—at WrestleMania XXIV. Other WWE championships are also contested for, while gimmick matches and personal feud matches also take place on the match card. Since 1993, the winner of the annual Royal Rumble match has been able to receive a guaranteed WWE Championship match at the same year's WrestleMania. With the introduction of the World Heavyweight Championship in 2002, the winner is also given the option to choose between the world title or the WWE championship. The creation of the ECW brad in June 2006 gave the Rumble winner a third option: to choose to challenge for the ECW World Championship. This option was made available from 2007 until the brand was retired in 2010. Wrestlemania 21 saw the introduction of the Money in the Bank ladder match. This match features six to ten participants and took place at six WrestleManias between 2005 and 2010 before becoming the headline match of its own pay-per-view event, Money in the Bank which incorporated the use of two Money in the Bank ladder matches for both respective WWE brands, Smackdown and Raw. The participant who retrieves the briefcase suspended above the ring wins a contract, which guarantees a world title match at the time and place of the winner's choosing for up to one year, including the following year's WrestleMania. Commentators For five of the first six WrestleManias Gorilla Monsoon and Jesse Ventura served as the color commentators (the exception being WrestleMania 2, which was split among three venues and had Monsoon, Ventura, and Vince McMahon split up with guest commentators), while Bobby Heenan and others filled guest roles. For WrestleMania VII and VIII, Monsoon and Heenan provided color commentary. In the mid to late 1990s the commentator team comprised Vince McMahon, Jim Ross and Jerry "The King" Lawler. Since the brand separation in 2002, matches from the Raw brand have been called by Ross and Lawler; the Smackdown matches called by Michael Cole, Tazz, John "Bradshaw" Layfield and Jonathan Coachman, and from 2006 to 2010, the ECW matches called by Joey Styles and Tazz. At WrestleMania XXV the first three man inter-brand commentary team since the WWE Brand Extension was used, and consisted of Jim Ross, Jerry "The King" Lawler, and Michael Cole. The following year Jim Ross was replaced by Matt Striker at WrestleMania XXVI. At WrestleMania XXVII Jim Ross returned to commentate, along with Josh Matthews and new SmackDown color commentator Booker T; the sudden change of commentary was due to a singles match between regular commentators Michael Cole and Jerry "The King" Lawler. Howard Finkel, who is credited with coming up with the name "WrestleMania" in 1984, has served as the long-standing ring-announcer and has appeared at every event, but since the WWE Brand Extension, Lillian Garcia, Tony Chimel and Justin Roberts have taken over as announcers for their respective brand matches. History 1980s The World Wrestling Federation staged the first WrestleMania on March 31, 1985 at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The main event was a tag-team match between the WWF Champion Hulk Hogan and Mr. T, accompanied by Jimmy Snuka against the team of Roddy Piper and Paul Orndorff, who were accompanied by Cowboy Bob Orton. The financial and critical success of the event secured the company's status as the most successful promotion in the United States, rising above competitors such as the National Wrestling Alliance and American Wrestling Association. In attendance were business celebrity Sy Sperling and broadcasting executive Tony D'Angelo. WrestleMania 2 was held the following year and took place in three venues across the country. The Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Uniondale, New York, the Rosemont, Horizon in Rosemont, Illinois, and the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena in Los Angeles, California. They each featured multiple matches that led up to the main event; this saw WWF Champion Hulk Hogan defeat the challenger King Kong Bundy in a steel cage match. A world indoor attendance-record of 93,173 fans was set at WrestleMania III, which was also the largest paying attendance in the history of professional wrestling at the time. The event is widely considered to be the pinnacle of the 1980s wrestling boom. To make certain that every seat in the Silverdom would be filled, the WWF decided to exclude the entire state of Michigan from pay-per-view access to the event, which made attending the event the only way for fans in Michigan to see it. The event featured Hulk Hogan defending the WWF Championship against Andre the Giant and the WWF Intercontinental Championship match between Randy Savage and Ricky Steamboat. WrestleMania IV was an all tournament event to crown a new WWF Champion. The second round of the tournament featured a rematch of the previous year's main event between Hulk Hogan and André the Giant while Randy Savage went on to defeat Ted Dibiase in the finals. The event returned the following year to Atlantic City, New Jersey for WrestleMania V, in which Hulk Hogan defeated Randy Savage for the WWF Championship Savage had won the previous year.